RELIGIOUS OUTLOOK

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 79, 27 May 1944, Page 6

RELIGIOUS OUTLOOK

THE psalms of human life (By the Rev. W. F. Pyke, 8.D.) Wc are re-discovering the value of the Psalms to-day. The old familiar utterances have new meanings in these tragic days in which vve are living. The psalms are associated with history and times of national crisis strain, and reconstruction, and Christian biography. They speak to men in their mother tongue and in the language of to-day. Some psalms are songs of battle, called forth by conditions of individual or national peril, written amid circumstances of fierce and bloody conflict. The reformers of the 16th century in their great contest for civil liberty and religious freedom; the Hugenots in France and persecution and conflict; the Covenanters in their stern and grim struggle against cruel oppression, all these found the psalms their comfort and strength. Many a stirring battle cry has been taken from the psalms. Cromwell's Ironsides went into battle with the watchword on their lips, “Let God arise and let His enemies be scattered.” Some psalms are songs of the nation, they speak of a national peril of common sorrow and danger, of a common appeal and responsibility. They strike a corporate note and stir a common patriotism. They are also songs of religious experience. They cover a period of five hundred years. A great deal can happen in that period. ’ Almost everything worth while in English history happened in five centuries. The psalms reflect national beliefs and aspirations, of times of depression and exaltation, of misgiving, penitence and hope. THE PSALMS TO-DAY What a storehouse of religious conviction is here for us to draw upon. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.” Here is a confession of faith. We see behind it a life history of a people whose truth is tried and tested in the long years of trial and change. They have a note of reality and are the finest expressions in all literature of religious patriotism. “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.” What do the Psalms tell us to-day? They reminok us of God’s sovereignty. “The Lord reigneth, be the earth never so unquiet.” His sovereignty is manifest in history. All events are ordered by Him. He is supreme over all. Hence all God’s enemies are scattered. The writers never doubted the triumph of right over might. God is on the side of right, of those who obey Him. He is their Sun and Shield.

They also tell us of a personal God who deals with man’s changeless hunger, hope, love, shame and anguish. No other book in the world is so sacred and so dear to Christian men and women. They are a record of man’s suffering and of his unfaltering faith and hope. “Be of good courage and He shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the Lord.” They also tell us of the conditions of true peace. Times of calamity are ti nes of heart-searching. As a people do we not need the chastening and cleansing of which they speak? The Penitential Psalms speak their message to us to-day. “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord, even he who has clean hands and a pure heart.” What passionate confessions, petitions and thanksgivings have found utterance in these verses? What multitudes have spent their last breath on its syllables. Lastly, the psalms tell us the secret of a happy and prosperous life. “Blessed is the man who hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners and hath not sat in the seat of the scornful.” We are bidden to “Trust, delight thyself in the Lord; to commit thy way unto the Lord, to rest in the Lord.” The writer looks outward and upward. The only precept that looks inward is the thrice repeated injunction “Fret not thyself.” These are times in which many people fret about the state of things, instead of actually believing and hoping and loving. We need the confidence of the man who can say, “O God. Thou are my God.” Happy are we when we have learned to say this, with the same tender confidence and happy personal possession as when we were little children, “My Mother.” If we listen we shall hear the still small voice saying. “O child, thou are My child, early and late I am seeking thee.”